Who was the audience of the Gettysburg Address?

Specifically, the audience of the Gettysburg Address were northerners or Gettysburg citizens, or all the American people supporting the civil war? Who were the audience when Lincoln delivered the speech?

It's for all of us. We are all there, reverently seated. It is forever.

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Intrepid

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Sun 21 Dec, 2008 08:54 am

@vickie007,

Since the speech was given at the event of the dedication of a national cemetary for the dead at Gettysburg, several people would have been invited from many areas.

Approximately 15,000 people are estimated to have attended the ceremony, including the sitting governors of six of the 24 Union states: Andrew Gregg Curtin of Pennsylvania, Augustus Bradford of Maryland, Oliver P. Morton of Indiana, Horatio Seymour of New York, Joel Parker of New Jersey, and David Tod of Ohio.

Canadian politician William McDougall attended as Lincoln's guest.

The precise location of the program within the grounds of the cemetery is disputed.

Reinterment of the bodies buried from field graves into the cemetery, which had begun within months of the battle, was less than half complete on the day of the ceremony.

I thought there were very few photographs taken at the event. If, in fact, there are several wide shots, I wonder why they haven't yet pinpointed the exact location.

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Mr Stillwater

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Mon 22 Dec, 2008 01:03 am

Lifted this from the Library of Congress:

Even though it is a drawing rather than a photograph, it has a perspective that shows the elevated area against the wall of the cemetery and the waterfeature beyond it. A little search on Google Earth or the Gettysburg Foundation site www.gettysburgfoundation.org should locate the approximate site.

In actuality Lincoln was not at the front of the stage declaiming furiously - that honour went to Edward Everett who gave a two-hour speech! It was as fabulously dull as Lincoln's was concise and brilliant.

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Mr Stillwater

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Mon 22 Dec, 2008 01:05 am

This is the image of Lincoln on the day. It took a while to set up and expose an image in those days. He has actually just given the speech, it only took a little over two minutes and had just sat down again. The photographer missed the money shot.

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Mr Stillwater

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Mon 22 Dec, 2008 10:13 pm

Of all the things about the 'Address' it is the brevity that is the most striking. It says much about the man - a long-winded pompous speech would have been such an ego boost as the thronged masses cheered. That would be a conceit (and I would compare this with a recent 'war-time President') and it is probably the most sincere message anyone has ever delivered in wartime.